


The Master of the Copper Mountain

by bonetrinket (neer)



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: A Lot Of Nature, Alternate Universe - Modern with Magic, Ambiguous/Open Ending, Fluff, Happy Ending, Light Angst, Lizard Victor everyone!, M/M, Minor Injuries, Mountain Spirit Victor, Photography Major Yuuri, Slavic Mythology & Folklore - Freeform, well kinda
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-03-24
Updated: 2019-03-24
Packaged: 2019-11-29 11:26:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,141
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18222515
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/neer/pseuds/bonetrinket
Summary: He had found Slavic tales a long time ago, in early childhood, when he lived in Hasetsu and didn’t think that someday his life would change drastically due to some kind of book. But it turned out that the exciting, often gloomy motifs of the legends of another culture had actually determined his future fate.And now he wanted to pay tribute to the tales that had captivated him so much by visiting places from the very first book.This place was the Ural Mountains.And the book... well, maybe one day Yuuri will found out, was it really just a fairy tale, or maybe something much, much more.





	The Master of the Copper Mountain

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks god I have two best persons in the world as my artist for this fic and my beta.  
> Like, really, guys, i LOVE you so much lol
> 
> So please everyone check out [dyeingdoll](https://dyeingdoll.tumblr.com/)'s art (for this fic, but not only, i mean i almost cry when i look at it it's so beautiful). And of couse don't forget about [Alice](https://archiveofourown.org/users/glitterpile/pseuds/glitterpile), my wonderful beta. Check out her works too ;)

White and gray waves of wispy clouds swept across the sky, alight with the gradually descending afternoon sun. There, high above, the wind raged, blowing so hard that the clouds hid beyond the horizon long before they’d have any time to take some recognisable form; but here, down below, the wind was hardly noticeable.

From time to time, it stirred the thick grass mottled with the blue dots of cornflowers; the big boughs of a nearby dark fir swayed lazily. The foliage of a lonely shrub, protruding from a split in a boulder, rustled quietly.

And then, even lower, on the mountainside right under their feet, an impenetrable coniferous forest spread out in absolute silence.

Yuuri looked back at his group walking ahead on the path, and quickly got his camera out of his backpack. He checked the battery, but so far it was charged enough; and even if it wasn’t, he had two more charged ones in his backpack. But he still checked them every time.

"Hey, Yuuri, are you coming?” He heard the cheerful voice of Phichit, his best friend and part-time guide of their small hike. Yuuri glanced at him briefly — Phichit, very discernible by his dark hair and skin against the background of greenery bathed in the sun, was waving with both hands. Chris was standing next to him, his hands on his hips. Yuuri didn’t see the expression on his face, but he knew that he was grinning.

“One moment!” he shouted in response, quickly setting up the necessary settings on the camera and taking a series of photos of the indescribable beauty spread out before him. Having quickly looked through the photos, he grimaced, erased them, set different settings and tried again.

The second result was more satisfying: he was able to capture the lonely fir tree standing nearby, a long scrape of the road winding along the top of the hill where they now walked, and the dark sea of spruce below. The light was a bit lame, but not so much that it couldn’t be fixed during processing.

Smiling, Yuuri gripped the camera tighter and ran to catch up with his group.

There were seven of them altogether, but Yuuri only knew two people well: Phichit, a sophomore from his faculty and his roommate for two last years, and Chris, who was dating Phichit and thereby brought into Yuuri's life. All the others were acquaintances of either Phichit or Chris, or maybe even acquaintances of acquaintances. Despite it being the second day of their trip, Yuuri wasn’t really eager to talk with them and sometimes still struggled to remember their names.

They had gone on this trip spontaneously, to tell the truth. It was July, the height of summer, all their exams had passed, and the last, fifth year of study at the department of photography loomed over Yuuri. For most of his classmates this didn’t matter much, but Yuuri had been thinking about his thesis for a very long time, and each time he wanted more and more of one thing: to make a project on the subject he loved the most — Slavic tales.

He had found them a long time ago, in early childhood, when he lived in Hasetsu and didn’t think that someday his life would change drastically due to some kind of book, which he had borrowed from the school library. But it turned out that the exciting, often gloomy motifs of the legends of another culture had actually determined his future fate.

Time passed, Yuuri grew up, he read more and more, he wondered, fantasized, tried to draw illustrations, which quickly turned into a love of art, and then to photography; and so when he was eighteen, he ended up at one of St. Petersburg’s universities with a major in photography.

And now he wanted to pay tribute to the tales that had captivated him so much by visiting places from the very first book.

This place was the Ural Mountains.

He had told Phichit, who already went hiking all the time, about this; the boy lit up with the idea, then told Chris, together they found the people, and after a couple of weeks, in the second half of July, Yuuri found himself in the place that he had dreamed about for almost all his adult life.

“Do you even have any space left?” Phichit’s smile was bright as the sun. He grabbed Yuuri’s camera and started flipping through the new photos. “We’ve been in the mountains for less than two days, and you already have, hmm... One GB of photos? Really?”

“It's beautiful here,” Yuuri said, adjusting his glasses and blushing a little. Well, he loved photography, was that a crime?

“Oh, mon cheri, you’ll have to shoot me somewhere near a forest lake,” Chris said with a half smile, holding his hand on Yuuri’s shoulders and leading him all the way down the road where the rest of their group was walking. Yuuri raised an eyebrow. The request seemed very... normal .

“If you want,” he said, shrugging. People had never been his passion, but for the sake of a friend... why not.

“Naked, of course,” Chris wiggled his eyebrows with Phichit’s loud laughter as a background; Yuuri dropped his jaw, scandalized. Frowning, he pulled a hood over his head.

“I'd rather refuse,” he mumbled.

Chris patted him on the shoulder, laughing, and then they went down the road in silence, enjoying the scenery around. The sun was still high enough, but it was clear that in another couple of hours they would need to look for a halt. When they got to the rest of the group, Phichit pointed to the high ground that was visible ahead of them and offered to stop somewhere not far from it.

An hour later, the beaten track was over and the forest began, smelling strongly of spruce, sun and moss. In some places, there were fields with bushes of still unripe berries (one of which Yuuri spent at least fifteen minutes photographing from all sides, because a big snail was creeping charmingly across a leaf. He would have spent more, but Phichit dragged him away by the strap of his backpack), in some places there were mushrooms, and in some places lay windfallen trees that they had to circumvent in uncharted and not always pleasant ways.

As a result, their maximum two-hour trek to the high ground took almost four hours, and when they finally climbed out onto a flat rock, proudly towering over a rather gentle slope where a narrow ribbon of the river glittered below, the sky was already painted pink and orange.

While everyone caught their breaths, throwing off their backpacks and looking for a comfortable camping place, Yuuri went to the edge of the cliff. It wasn’t sheer, but he could dangle his legs from it, if he wanted to. Right under the rock, a stony slope covered with grass tufts stretched into the undergrowth and then completely into the forest. Yuuri wondered if it was possible to jump off the edge and get to the river, and how long it would take. According to his calculations, no more than half an hour, if he didn’t stumble upon another bunch of windfallen trees.

“Hey, cheri,” Chris whispered over his ear, scaring Yuuri so much that he gasped convulsively and nearly fell down. Chris grabbed his shoulder in time, looking at him with amusement and surprise at the same time. “What was that? Anyway, Phichit was asking where you want to sleep.”

Ah, so here was the problem. Despite the fact that they were hiking the second day, last night they had slept in a hostel in a tiny town at the foot of the mountains, so Yuuri didn’t have to share a tent and feel embarrassed. But today was the day.

Phichit’s tent was designed for two people. And, of course, it was where Phichit and _Chris_ were supposed to sleep, not Phichit and Yuuri. But then Yuuri himself would have to spend the night with someone unfamiliar, and the last thing in the world he wanted was to wake up face to face with some stranger.

“Well... um..." he hesitated, hugging himself on his shoulders. He really hoped that Chris would understand everything without words.

“What, you wanna sleep with my boyfriend?” he asked with a wink, moving a bit closer to Yuuri and seductively putting his hand on Yuuri’s thigh. The situation was familiar — but no less terrible. Chris, apparently, noticed Yuuri’s expression because he laughed out loud. “Well, so be it, I don’t really mind.”

He winked again and went back to Phichit, who ruffled his own hair and laughed. Yuuri was  pretty sure they were laughing at him.

Sighing, he walked over to them, wandered around a bit, because there was no need to help in setting up the tent, and photographing while others were working was embarrassing, and eventually volunteered to go down to the river and see if they could use it wash up. This decision was received with enthusiasm, and Yuuri was handed an empty water canister, a knife, a GPS and a wish for a successful expedition. Phichit even volunteered to go with him, but Yuuri considered the distance and location and refused.

Instead, he took his camera — partly trying to make it so that no one noticed — and hit the road.

It was quiet and still bright in the forest. The sun's rays penetrated the boughs of the spruce trees and formed pools of light on a blanket of needles, from which beautiful scarlet fly-agarics grew here and there. Yuuri gave one a miss, a second, a third — but then he came across a family of two mushrooms and spent a lot of time crawling around them and trying to pick a better angle. He almost forgot about his task and remembered it only when the sunspot was gone, and the forest became noticeably dark.

Yuuri checked the time — it was still an hour before sunset, but the spruce grove already lost a lot of light. Fortunately, the closer he came to the river, the lesser the trees became and the thicker the undergrowth was, especially the moss into which Yuuri’s legs began to sink.

Exhausted and drenched, Yuuri reached the river just when the sun touched the water's edge, painting everything around with gold and pink splashes. He exhaled in amazement, frozen for a moment, but then hurried to the water.

The shore was high, but not too high: if Yuuri sat on it and hung his legs, his sneakers would touch the water. Although it was inconvenient and very dirty to descend from him, he didn’t want to jump — sticking out of the water there were - not really sharp, but still - stones, and Yuuri didn’t want to slip and smash his head.

He had to go down carefully, first sitting down on the wet grass, then sliding down, resting his hands. Of course, having done this and getting his clothes dirty, Yuuri noticed a rather smooth descent a few meters upstream .

He sighed gravely, complaining about his poor fortune, glanced wistfully at the distant sun, then at his camera, but decided not to linger, promising himself to return here tomorrow morning.

Because down here, when he was all alone, it was amazingly nice.

Inhaling deeply, Yuuri leaned down to get some water and noticed in the stream several silver fish that flashed past like tiny lightnings. A crow cawed somewhere above his head, another one from the forest responded to it, and Yuuri, having forgotten everything, leaned back on the muddy slope of the shore.

“I don't want to go back,” he breathed, talking to the whole forest at once. He didn’t want to admit this to himself — let alone tell Phichit — but it would have been better if they had gone hiking with only the three of them, rather than dragging along a bunch of strangers.

Something rustled in the grass next to his hand, and Yuuri hurriedly pulled it away. The grass moved, but nothing jumped out. But from somewhere at his feet a toad croaked, hinting that it was time to get to work, so he leaned down and filled the canister with water.

The sun had gone down by almost a quarter. Yuuri checked the GPS and, constantly glancing at the river over his shoulder, walked back to the camp.

As it turned out, he could have just stayed at the river, because obviously everyone had forgotten about him. Except, perhaps, Phichit, who greeted him with a cheerful “Hey” at the sight of Yuuri appearing from the forest with water in his hands. But that made sense, because Phichit was the only person in need of water.

The rest of the group were doing well with the vodka they had bought in the village.

“Seriously, they bought that much?” Yuuri asked quietly, with both horror and admiration looking at the row of bottles lined up in a clearing around the crackling fire illuminating four tents.

Two girls with their hair in buns sat next to one of the tents, plastic cups in their hands, and giggled about something, glancing at some guys Yuuri didn’t know who were currently trying to climb the pine tree. It looked... not very fun. At least for a sober person.

“If you prefer finer alcohol, I have a bottle of wine. It’s only for VIPs,” Chris said, winking at Phichit. The boy beamed and pulled Yuuri by his sleeve.

“Want some?”

“...No, thank you,” Yuuri pulled away, hugging himself with his hand on his shoulder. “I— Maybe later.”

“Are you sure? It’s the first day of our trip, well, kinda. Are you sure you don’t want to celebrate?” Phichit asked. “If you don’t want vodka, there’s some beer and energy drinks—”

“No, thanks.”

Phichit glanced at him with a funny look in his eyes, but didn’t insist, although Yuuri was sure that he would try again later. His friend was able to leave him alone when needed, but he would invariably come in half an hour to see and cheer Yuuri up.

When they parted, Yuuri nevertheless found an energy drink amongst the row of bottles and went to the edge of the cliff, sitting down with a sigh. One of the sleeves of his jacket was still wet from the river water, but he decided that he would dry it later.

So far, he didn’t really want to go back to the bonfire.

And not even because he wasn’t welcome there. Quite on the contrary: Yuuri knew that he would be accepted into their little circle. He just didn’t want to feel lonely among the crowd, but now loneliness was looming above him anyway.

He wouldn’t belong there. Chris obviously wanted to be in the company of his boyfriend, and although he and Phichit were happy to spend some time with Yuuri, he felt like a third wheel. And sometimes he would catch himself staring as they started kissing. Just because he had no one to kiss.

Sighing, he opened the energy drink, looking at the stars lit in the sky and listening to joyful cries behind his back. If it were not for them, it was possible to imagine that he was completely alone, because there was nothing in front — only a black sea of trees, except that somewhere the sharp tops of fir trees looked a little different from real water. Although, if you imagined that they were waves...

Sometimes he hated himself for how hard it was for him to open up to other people. It wasn’t a social anxiety — at least not in the general sense of the word. Yuuri knew how — at least tried —  to control himself before speaking in public, didn’t suffer from lack of attention, and sometimes — not very often, unfortunately — looked at himself in the mirror and even thought that he was pretty good looking. But he never knew how to cross that border, which separates an acquaintance from a close friend, and a close friend — from a loved one. In his friendship with Phichit, it was the latter who pushed everything forward, and if it were not for his ability to understand human nature and the absence of fear to get into Yuuri's personal space, they would have remained only roommates.

Having a best friend is, of course, wonderful. But sometimes Yuuri just wanted to find someone to get closer with. In every sense of the word.

Yuuri snorted quietly, rubbing his shoulder. He doubted that there was a person in the whole world that he could trust so much.

Raising his head to the sky, Yuuri slowly drank his energy drink, not distracted by the party. Only once was he disturbed — when some freshman, laughing as he ran away from one of the girls, crashed into Yuuri, and the three of them almost flew down the slope. They quickly apologized to Yuuri and fled further, while Phichit approached Yuuri, who rubbed his head.

Yuuri smiled at him and patted the ground, offering to take a seat.

Phichit sat down, silently held out a glass of wine, and this time Yuuri accepted it out of mere gratitude.

“Are you brooding over here?” Phichit asked, nodding towards the forest, as if it contained Yuuri’s sadness. Yuuri shrugged, sipping his wine. After the energy drink, it was unpleasantly bitter.

“I’m thinking. You know, there isn’t a single tale about these mountains with a truly happy ending,” said Yuuri unexpectedly.

Phichit laughed loudly.

“You know how to inspire your friends before an adventure!” he said. “None of that, our trip will definitely end happily. Maybe you will find yourself some prince turned into a frog?” he shoved Yuuri with his elbow, and Yuuri wasn’t even offended. It was Phichit, after all.

“Only if I shot an arrow,” he answered, and Phichit snorted.

“What?”

Yuuri just shook his head, smiling easily. His friend hadn’t read a single Russian fairy tale, so it wasn’t surprising that he didn’t get the reference.

“Chris will miss you, won’t he?” he asked instead. Phichit pretended to think about it.

“I don't even know. He only talks about some Japanese boy named Yuuri Katsuki, do you happen to know him? Like, _Phichit, isn’t Yuuri lonely there_ , or _Phichit, is Yuuri alright_. I wonder what that means.”

“For some reason I think that it’s you who said that,” muttered Yuuri with a warm smile that didn’t fade even when Phichit stood up and extended his hand to him.

“Hm, maybe I am,” he said, grinning. “Let's go. I’ll introduce you to everyone, so believe me, by the end of the trip they’ll become your best friends. I guarantee that.”

Phichit pulled him up, and Yuuri turned around, checking what the others were doing. Some guy, catching his gaze, waved happily, and Yuuri waved back with an awkward smile.

Maybe he really could relax a little...

* * *

 

As it turned out, the “relaxing” part of being drunk sometimes could be a bit more relaxing than it actually should. At least, in Yuuri’s opinion, because the party was just starting to die, and even without sleep, he already didn’t remember half of the night.

But his throat was sore with laughter, and his hair was messy from someone’s — Phichit’s, probably — palm, and the first rays of sun were so beautiful, flooding everything with pinkish light, that Yuuri’s chest was bubbling with excitement for everything to come. For _everything_.

“Where’s my camera,” he mumbled, holding on to some guy he was dancing with several minutes ago. His name was on the tip of his tongue, but he still couldn’t quite catch it. Well, it’s not like he cared right now.

He soon found it in his tent — of course, where else could it be — and held it close to his chest. The morning forest was gorgeous under their camp’s cliff, so he went to the edge on unsteady legs and slumped next to some boulder, stretching out his legs.

“Oh, it’s so nice...” he almost moaned, smiling at the shy beams of light peeking out over the pine tops.

He needed to capture it, surely — but his hands trembled, and after several attempts to take the most beautiful photo, Yuuri gave up and took out his phone to take a couple of stories for Instagram. Quite an unexpected decision, but perhaps Phichit, the king of social things, had finally managed to infect him with his love as he had long ago promised.

The stories turned out quite good — and although Yuuri doubted whether they would be uploaded in the near absence of mobile communications, he didn’t care. He was feeling…

...great.

So much that he couldn’t quite stop smiling, wide and slightly drunk, but happy all the same.

And he really wanted to hug someone. He thought about Vicchan, about his parents — about everyone who he couldn’t embrace. But his insides were bursting with warmth, and he needed to throw it out onto someone.

“Hey, Phich—” he began, turning to call out to his friend and tear him away from Chris, but then something cold and wet touched his palm.

Involuntary jerking, Yuuri shook his head, leaning heavily with his hand on the ground behind his back to prevent himself from falling. Looking down, he raised an eyebrow. A turquoise lizard sat in front of him, lifting itself up on its green hind legs.

_Can lizards even stand up?_ The useless thought flashed through his mind while Yuuri sat and blinked, trying to understand why the lizard wasn’t running away.

It didn’t move. Yuuri waved his hand at it. No response — maybe only a little bow of its head.

After a pause, Yuuri reached out for the lizard and touched the tip of its tail with his finger, slightly pressing on it. The lizard finally twitched, wagged its tail and wriggled away, but not far. It stopped again, lifting itself up. With a smile, Yuuri pressed on the tip of its tail again. The lizard wriggled away.

Yuuri pressed down again. The lizard wriggled away. Pressed down. Wriggled away. This went on for several minutes — very soon Yuuri completely forgot about the beautiful dawn and was full-on trying to grab the nimble lizard flickering before his eyes and not letting itself be caught. He didn’t even suspect that there were such clever creatures among them — the lizard seemed to play with him on purpose, and perhaps it was because of the remnants of alcohol in his blood, but it felt like it was making fun of him.

“Hey, wait, hey, hey,” he drawled, as the lizard darted onto the boulder next to Yuuri with a lightning movement. He tried to drive it from there back to the ground, but the lizard took advantage of the motion and ran across his palm to the wrist, where it stopped again, watching the man laugh in front of it. “Ticklish,” said Yuuri honestly. “And cold.”

Carefully, trying not to frighten the lizard, he stroked its head, and then smiled.

“Come here,” he whispered, raising his hand closer to his face. The lizard moved to the middle of his palm, watching him with blue eyes. A strange white pattern ran across its body, resembling pictures that could be seen in a kaleidoscope. The tip of its tail was completely white, and the paws were more marble-green than turquoise. Probably, the lizard was rare... it was worth taking a picture of it or something...

But Yuuri didn’t have time to reach for the camera, because he heard Phichit’s cheerful, albeit slightly painful voice:

“Yuuri!”

“Mm?” Yuuri said, loudly, but trying not to frighten the lizard.

“Come here! Now! The faster the better! Need some water, but can’t stand...” Phichit made the voice of a poor dying man, and Yuuri sighed. Well, he still had time to take a picture...

Operating the camera with one hand was inconvenient and, of course, the pictures weren’t amazing again, but after three attempts the lizard began to fidget, and a deliberately loud moan came from the tents, so Yuuri put the camera aside and quickly glanced over the top of the boulder to where his friend threatened to wake up the entire slowly falling asleep camp.

“I'm coming, I'm coming!” He shouted, and then turned to the lizard and smiled. “Thank you,” he whispered, and — without much thought — touched its head with his lips in a quick kiss.

The lizard froze, as if taken by surprise, and then slipped over Yuuri’s hand back onto the boulder, hastily sliding down from it and hiding in the thick grass.

_Wow, embarrassed lizard,_ Yuuri thought, dumbfounded. And after a moment, he broke into a grin.

Apparently, the hike promised to be if not perfect, then at least not so bad.

[ ](https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/511286987710529536/559385523249086464/kiss_finished.png)


End file.
